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Feeling lucky? Powerball jackpot among largest ever

MANCHESTER - The Thanksgiving leftovers are being recycled and the early morning Black Friday door busters are past history, so you had best get to the nearest Lottery outlet and buy your Powerball ticket.

It may have escaped your notice, what with the Thanksgiving preparations and football games and Friday's shopping bargains, but the Powerball jackpot for Saturday night's drawing is projected to be $325 million dollars, or a cash value of $212.8 million before taxes.

And that's the estimate provided by the New Hampshire Lottery Friday, before people realize how big the jackpot is and buy enough tickets to increase it.

In case you are wondering, it's bidding to be the third largest Powerball jackpot ever.

The largest was $365 million won on Feb. 18, 2006, on one ticket shared by eight workers in Nebraska, and the second largest was $340 million, won on Oct. 19, 2005, shared by two familes in Oregon.

A service desk spokesman at the Hannaford grocery store at 859 Hanover St. said that the pace of ticket sales wasn't unusual Friday and speculated that Saturday will be the day for lines at the lottery ticket machine.

The executive director of the New Hampshire Lottery urges people not to miss out on the opportunity for a huge jackpot.

"With the holiday shopping season now in full swing, tell me who couldn't use some extra cash or maybe a million or two?" said Charlie McIntyre. "We want the next Powerball winner from New Hampshire!"

Powerball tickets are on sale at over 1,250 locations in New Hampshire until 9:50 p.m. Saturday night.